


In Your Favourite Darkness

by Neurocrat



Category: Daredevil (TV)
Genre: Clubbing, Dancing, Goths, Landman & Zack era, Lipstick & Lip Gloss, M/M, Makeup, Mouth Kink
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-31
Updated: 2017-03-31
Packaged: 2018-10-13 03:26:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,956
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10505451
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Neurocrat/pseuds/Neurocrat
Summary: Foggy brings Matt over to the goth side.





	

**Author's Note:**

> For Daredevil Bingo. In the middle of several other WIPS, I’m misguidedly doing my wild card first. General tropes: Dancing. (Makeup isn’t on the list, and cross-dressing doesn’t really fit, but, my impetus was wanting Foggy to put makeup on Matt so they can go clubbing together.)
> 
> EDIT (6/20/17)! I commissioned art for this fic from [iraya!](http://iraya.tumblr.com/)

They’ve been working at Landman and Zack for an exhausting month. Foggy desperately needed to get as far away from yuppie corporate culture as possible, just for one night. That’s how he ended up at Matt’s apartment, squatting in front of Matt, who is sitting on the lid of the toilet, carefully painting eyeliner on him.

Foggy threw together the idea during a painful Friday afternoon meeting. His thoughts drifted to how much he needed a beer. No – he needed more than a beer. Tonight he needed a Long Island Iced Tea, or more than one. He needed to look at people wearing black makeup and combat boots, to purge his head of all the suits and ties and Ralph Lauren and J Crew.

“We’re going out tonight,” he told Matt at the end of the day.

“That sounds great,” Matt sighed, rubbing his face. “Josie is probably forgetting who we are; we haven’t been there in more than a week.”

“I’m thinking something different,” Foggy said. “You heard of the Inferno?”

Matt frowned. “I usually don’t go in for nightclubs, you know that,” he reminded Foggy, referring to college times. “I mean, it’s mostly the crowds. The shoving and pushing; too many people being, you know, unpleasant.”

“The Inferno is different,” Foggy said. “First of all, it’s not that crowded compared to the mainstream clubs. But also, the people are way more polite. It’s this whole different vibe. Like, if someone bumps into you, they actually say ‘sorry’.”

Matt laughs. “Instead of getting grabby until you have to hurt them? Yeah, that _does_ sound like a different vibe.” He still was unsure, though, making an argument for a nice, sedate bar. Foggy talked him into trying out the Inferno, just once, promising cheap drinks and vivid descriptions of the interesting costumes the patronage would be wearing.

“Plus, it’s their Depeche-Mode-battles-The-Cure night,” Foggy tells Matt, looking up the club calendar on his phone. “We _have_ to go.”

Matt wrinkles his nose, but admits, “That might be less offensive than standard club music.”

“That’s the spirit,” Foggy says brightly, choosing to take Matt’s statement as acquiescence. He raises his coffee mug. “To places that are less offensive!”

\---

Foggy first makes a stop at his apartment to scarf some leftovers, change, and dig out his goth club supplies, which are gathering dust in his closet and bathroom drawers. He hasn’t been to a club like this in a few years. He liked to check them out once in a while in college, drawn to the music and, well, the outfits, the makeup. The girls with spiked mohawks, with flowing, tattered black skirts. The guys with their dark scary makeup. The way nobody looked askance at Foggy in his metal band T-shirt and cargo shorts. The way he could strike up a conversation with one of those guys in dark scary makeup, and if he turned out to be straight or not interested, he would let Foggy down gently with a polite smile or a casual reference to a girlfriend – no offense taken, no threats or macho posturing.

Foggy had had his goth-club alternate-reality all to himself in college. He and Matt had gone together to a more traditional nightclub once, and Matt had hated it, so Foggy didn’t ask again. Then, when Foggy started dating Marci, his goth nights ground to a halt. Goth was clearly not her scene; she already seemed to think his tattoos were a little freaky. He was afraid what she’d think of his favorite clubs, the makeup he’d been clumsily applying for his outings, so he never brought it up with her. He’d gone back once or twice post-Marci, to try to find a soothing rebound hook-up. And that had been it for a while.

Foggy heads over to Matt’s place with his satchel full of the things he prays Matt will not react to with discomfort or disgust. Matt comes to the door still wearing his work shirt, tie and blazer removed. As Foggy comes in, Matt holds up a nicer, silkier dress shirt for Foggy to inspect. “How about this?”

“No no no, dude, this place isn’t one of those kind of clubs. There’s a different way of dressing up,” Foggy says. “Which, fortunately, there’s a lot of leeway. You don’t have to be, like, in bondage gear, although that’s okay too. Have you got black jeans?”

“Yeah. I mean, they were black when I bought them,” Matt says, headed to his bedroom. Foggy hovers in the doorway of the room as Matt opens a dresser drawer where things are organized by color, by darks and lights, so Matt can find what he needs. He pulls out an old pair of jeans he probably hasn’t worn since college. The black color has faded, but Foggy says they’ll do fine. “It’ll be dark in the club, anyway. Now, how about a black T-shirt?”

Matt pulls one out of a drawer. “Perfect,” declares Foggy.

“Great,” says Matt, unbuttoning his work shirt. “This is easier than I thought.” Foggy shifts to his other foot and clears his throat, looking around the room for something to put his eyes on other than Matt as Matt strips his undershirt off over his head and pulls on the black T. Foggy looks back at Matt, stupidly thinking it’s safe now that he’s got the shirt on, but no, not really – the shirt is a disturbingly nice fit around the shoulders and chest; plus, Matt is unbuckling his pants now. “Um, I’m going to finish getting ready, meet me in the bathroom,” Foggy says, backing out of the room, turning away just in time to avoid seeing Matt sliding his pants down.

Foggy takes things out of his satchel and sets them on the bathroom counter, looking at himself in Matt’s mirror. This is the part he is not sure he can get Matt on board with: the makeup. Foggy has nail polish, in black and in a dirty green, but he’s too impatient to put that on now and wait for it to dry, and to have to scrub it off before work on Monday. He has some gothy lipstick colors. And he has brushes and pencils, for applying black gunk around one’s eyes.

At first he didn’t know what to get, what would work, what brands were good; he would just wander around Walgreens trying to pick stuff out on his own, as a dude who had never been schooled in makeup. Finally it hit him that he could ask advice from his sisters, on the pretense of “Marci says she needs a new eyeliner, and I want to surprise her with something nice.”

So Foggy owns one tube of pretty decent eyeliner. He uncaps it, and it’s still liquid and workable after all these years. He leans forward in the mirror and starts applying it thickly. He wonders if it will be more embarrassing or weird to have to describe to Matt how he looks, instead of Matt being able to just see him all at once. He debates how much detail to use.

Matt leans against the doorway of the bathroom in his too-perfect black T-shirt and the faded black jeans that look even better on him now than they did in college, when he was a little skinnier. He’s got an awkward smile. “So, you wouldn’t have dressed me up in regular clothes to take me out to a drag club, would you have?” He asks.

“Um. You can smell the makeup?” Foggy guesses. “Don’t worry, it’s … Not what you think? It’s, like, industrial club makeup. Very… Manly.” He laughs nervously.  “Here, I’ll try to show you.” He steers Matt to face the mirror with him, takes Matt’s offered fingers, and guides them softly around the outer corner of Foggy’s eye. The eyeliner hasn’t fully dried and smears a little, which only helps out the messy goth look. “See, it’s just a thick mess. It’s black, just a black smudge around my eyes, basically. I fit in better that way. Otherwise, the gothiest thing I have on is Invader Zim on my T-shirt.”

Matt nods as Foggy finishes up his other eye. “I bet that looks pretty good on you.”

Foggy snorts. “The beauty of it is that it really doesn’t matter,” he says, “goth is all about celebrating the ugly.”

“Will you put it on me?” Matt asks quickly, and Foggy’s hand twitches, ruining the straight line he was making. He’d been puzzling over in his head how to approach or not approach the idea, how to offer that to Matt without being weird, and Matt has magically solved the puzzle for him.

“Of course! Yes, yes I will put eyeliner on you. Yeah. No problem.”

“That won’t …make you uncomfortable, will it?”

“No, buddy, of course not. I mean, you can’t really put it on yourself, right? Let me just finish up this eye.”

Before long, he is in a crouch alongside Matt, leaning in close and trying to steady his hand with the brush, trying not to breathe too hard on his face. Trying not to think about how much better an angle he’d have to do this from if he straddled Matt’s lap. Foggy’s other hand is holding the back of Matt’s head for leverage and to keep him still, but Matt’s very good at keeping still on his own, his breathing steady and controlled. His eyes are unfocused as usual, allowing himself long blinks when Foggy pulls the brush away.

Foggy wishes he was better at this, could apply eyeliner like the women they work with, professional-looking, with smooth, even lines. He doesn’t strive for perfection on his own face, but somehow Matt’s face seems to deserve it. When he sits back and looks at his work, it’s in an awkward middle-zone of messiness, like someone tried to apply it prettily and failed.

So Foggy takes two fingertips against the lower lid of one of Matt’s eyes and drags down, leaving a big black smudge. Matt sucks in a breath, surprised. Foggy does it to the other eye, a little differently, deliberately not trying for symmetry.

“I must look like some kind of monster now,” Matt says.

Foggy admires his work. He takes a shaky breath. “You look pretty fucking badass, if that’s what you mean,” he says. “You know what would… Would you let me put on you…?” He fumbles among the stuff littering the counter, uncaps a lipstick the color of drying blood. “It’s a lipstick,” Foggy says, in case Matt couldn’t tell from the sound, although he is already smiling. “It’s a sort of deep red.”

“You’re the goth expert,” Matt says, gamely.

“Open your mouth.” Foggy does not color in the lines; that is not the way of lipstick on dudes, not the way Foggy sees it. He applies some in the middle of each lip, then rubs his thumb over to spread it out, letting the color spill off one corner of Matt’s mouth. He’s breathing shallowly as his thumb drags over Matt’s lower lip, a little too aware of how it feels, how it looks: Matt’s open mouth looking hungry and sultry, his lip deforming under the pressure of Foggy’s thumb. Matt is blushing. Foggy realizes that his thumb has lingered too long, as he stared, and takes it away. He tells himself that the small sigh he just heard Matt make, as he stands up and turns away, must have just been from holding his breath to keep his mouth still.

“How do I look?” Matt asks, turning his face up to Foggy as Foggy caps the lipstick.

“Frighteningly gorgeous,” Foggy says, in a light tone of voice as if it’s a joke, but it isn’t.

Matt laughs, hands coming up to his own face and hovering, not touching. “It feels really weird. I have to try to remember not to rub my eyes, or bite my lip.”

“You get used to it,” Foggy says, uncapping a lipstick for himself. “Besides, if you accidentally do, it will just add to the effect.” He puts on his own lipstick in the mirror, in a similar fashion, just a little smeared and out of place.

He turns back to Matt, who has an absorbed look, listening to Foggy’s actions. “That’s lipstick, too, right? What color are you putting on?”

“Dark grey,” Foggy says, dabbing at it on his mouth to get it right. “A sort of charcoal, if you will. The very essence of industrial. Like, actual soot.”

Matt looks like he’s thinking about it, trying to imagine it. He smiles and shakes his head.

“Get up,” Foggy says when he’s done. They stand side-by-side in front of the mirror. Foggy puts his arm around Matt’s shoulders and admires his handiwork. “Okay, we look pretty fucking ready for the goth club,” he says.

“Like vampires?” Matt asks.

“Yeah. Well, _you_ look like a vampire. One of those ones that human girls throw themselves at to be fed on. I look more like a death metal bass player.”

Matt laughs. “That sounds awesome.”

“Let me take a selfie of us,” Foggy says. “I promise you, this is not going on Facebook or anywhere. Our fellow sharks at Landman and Zack would make sure we never get a job again.”

He points his phone, tilts his head against Matt’s. “Don’t smile,” he says, and Matt quickly wipes his off. “Goths have to look serious!” That makes them both struggle not to grin stupidly. Foggy ends up taking several shots, most with one or the other of them failing to keep a straight face, one with Matt hiding his laughter in Foggy’s hair.

Foggy wipes his eyes, chuckling as he swipes through the pictures. “These are great. I wish you had one of those fancy printers to make a bas-relief of it, or whatever, so you could feel them.”

“We don’t even need to go to the club now,” says Matt, “this was fun enough by itself.”

“Oh no, you’re not getting out of it,” Foggy says. “Oh hey. I almost forgot: Accessories.”

He lets Matt feel the leather cuffs with metal studs, one for each wrist. “I guess we can each wear one, and match?” Foggy says.

“Like friendship bracelets,” Matt says.

Foggy giggles. “No, we can’t do that. The way that would look, that might, uh, dissuade people from hitting on you.”

“Maybe that’s what I want.” Sounds like typical, I-deserve-my-sad-funk Matt, except he is smiling weirdly at Foggy.

“Dude, you don’t understand. The way you look right now, you’re going to have some _attention_. Polite, gentle attention, don’t get me wrong – the Inferno does not take kindly to creeps. But yes. Attention. There are usually some pretty interesting women there, too.”

Matt shrugs, still smiling. “Whatever. I think you just want to wear both of them.”

“That is my usual _modus operandi_ ,” Foggy admits, putting one on each wrist. He looks at his hands. “The black nail polish would really complete this, but I’m not doing that.”

“Good,” says Matt, “I can’t stand the smell of nail polish.”

“Alright – time for some pre-gaming?” Foggy suggests, pulling a bottle of cheap vodka out of his satchel.

\---

After a couple of shots, they catch a cab to the Inferno. Foggy gets them drinks – the Long Island he’s been wishing for to dissolve away the week, to help him melt into the club environment. They stand near the corner of the bar drinking them, Foggy providing a steady stream of descriptions.

“She’s got a shaved head except for long hair in front of her ears on each side, with a ring through her septum and a curly tattoo on the back of her neck,” he says about someone nearby, until she turns and looks at him. Foggy grins and waves. “Sorry. Just helping my blind friend do some people-watching.” She stares at Matt for a second – he left his glasses with his cane and jacket at the coat check, the better to show off his eye makeup – but she must be able to tell that his eyes are unfocused, or maybe just the way he turns up the charm dial on his smile works on her, because she shakes her head and waves her hand in a “no worries” gesture and leaves them alone.

“Oh good, I’m so glad Armor Guy is here!” Foggy continues excitedly. “This guy comes here sometimes wearing this homemade costume that looks like armor- it’s plastic, I think? Covered in little triangular pieces of mirrors. He dances really good.” Matt must have made a lucky guess, because he is turning his head to point pretty much right at where armor-guy is dancing.

“You come here a lot,” Matt observes.

“I used to, once in a while,” Foggy says. “In college… Oh, there’s Naked Girl,” he continues. “I used to see her every time I came here. Her thing is kind of: as little clothing as possible. Today, she has, let’s see. Some purple hot pants, very tight… Looks like… Yep, electrical tape on her nipples, and a pink feather boa. Her hair is dyed really light blond, in a pixie cut. I wish I could describe her body to you more, since the rest of us can see a whole lot, but that would make me feel even more like a pervert, somehow.”

“It’s okay,” Matt says, “I have my imagination.”

“There’s the usual cadre of goth fairies,” Foggy goes on. “Big, flowing black clothes, long skirts, kind of witchy-looking. Lots of flowing movements with their arms. Some people like to hold their arms behind their backs and take these big steps. Just some kind of goth dancing style. I never figured it out.”

“You dance?” Matt asks.

“Me? No. I don’t really know how… I would look like an idiot.”

“I doubt that,” Matt says. “I think it’s pretty easy, right? In clubs, I mean – it’s not like there are steps. People just… Move.”

“How would you know, dude?” Foggy asks, chuckling. “Wait – do you dance? I mean, did you take lessons, or something?”

Matt shrugs, takes a drink. “Elektra showed me some things.”

“She did? Like what? Show me!”

Matt laughs and ducks his head. “It’s not right for – it doesn’t match this place, this music.”

“Nobody cares,” Foggy insists. “Do you think Naked Girl cares? Or Armor Guy? C’mon, show me. Pleeeease!”

“Alright,” says Matt. “She showed me how to tango.”

He gulps the rest of his drink and puts the glass down while Foggy gapes at him dumbly. Foggy has not finished assimilating what is happening before Matt is taking Foggy’s drink out of his hand and moving it to the bar. Matt is up close and personal, then, one arm sliding firmly around his waist, the other hand taking Foggy’s, and he pulls Foggy into him until their chests are pressed together. Foggy wants to make some kind of sarcastic remark, but his throat doesn’t seem to be letting any air out.

Matt smiles at him, his eyes with their black smudges, red-smeared mouth inches away from Foggy’s, and Matt moves, a subtle push forward that causes Foggy to automatically step backwards, toward the main dance floor. A Depeche Mode song is playing; the DJ has added a thumping beat on top of the lazy, ethereal vocals, and Matt effortlessly steers Foggy into the steps and direction he wants Foggy to go, doing a surprisingly good job of avoiding the other bodies moving around them. He murmurs an instruction to Foggy once in a while, and Foggy struggles to follow them. “Okay, now a step to your right, there you go. And bring your left foot in towards it- that’s right.” Foggy laughs nervously, shaking his head. He should feel more embarrassed. They must look ridiculous - or at least he knows he must. But he’s concentrating too hard on making his feet do what Matt wants them to do. And on Matt’s warm body and strong grip on him, Matt’s fluid grace.

Foggy’s tension must be detectable in his body. “Oh come on, it’s not so bad,” Matt laughs.

Foggy splutters. “It’s really hard! I mean, if you weren’t directing me around…”

“That’s the point,” Matt says. “When I learned this, I had to learn how to lead. I give your body the signals to tell it where to go.”

_Ain’t that the truth_ , Foggy’s disobedient brain remarks to him.

“Now, compared to this, dancing like people generally do in clubs, that’s got to be easy, right?” Matt goes on. The Depeche Mode song has bled into New Order’s Bizarre Love Triangle, a classic goth anthem, and the people around them pick up in energy, jump up and down. More people standing around the edges move into the dance area, and Matt and Foggy are in a tighter crush, unable to step in the patterns Matt was having them do a moment ago. “We can try doing what they’re doing,” Matt says, not explaining where he gets any idea what the dancers around them are doing. Still hanging onto Foggy’s waist and hand, he shimmies his shoulders a little in time with the music, letting his head be loose on his neck.

“You’re such a dork,” Foggy jokes, because Matt holding him like this, Matt moving like that, he has to make fun of it or he might get overwhelmed. “We’re both such dorks.” He tries to move his shoulders along with Matt’s, and Matt matches him, eerily accurate. “Okay, we have to lose the tango grip now.”

That was an opening, he realizes as the words come out of his mouth. A question. Matt could let go of Foggy completely now. Or interpret it a different way. Which he does: he lets go of Foggy’s right hand to slide both arms around Foggy’s back.

Matt answered the question; Foggy doesn’t have to hold back anymore. As the synth violins do their fluttery thing in the song, he pulls Matt’s head forward and kisses him. They make out in the middle of the press of people. Nobody minds; it’s after midnight and everyone is drunk and sexy and having fun and being themselves. Foggy breathes out in something like relief getting to run his hands over Matt’s arms, the shoulders and back muscles that Foggy’s been trying not to stare at in his T-shirt. Finally getting to press his mouth onto those lips he was touching earlier that night.

They pull apart for a moment. Foggy’s charcoal lipstick is smeared all over Matt’s mouth, mixed with his red, and Matt just looks even more goth. Foggy rubs his thumb over Matt’s bottom lip like before, sliding through the mess of lipstick and spit. “It’s a good look for you,” he says. “Trust me.” Matt presses his body more firmly into Foggy’s, chest to thighs. “I trust you,” he says.

\---

As they exit the club to head back to Foggy’s place – Matt with one arm around Foggy’s waist, nuzzling into his hair and leaving lipstick marks all over his neck – Foggy passes a woman entering the club who looks strikingly familiar. She’s in full dominatrix gear: tall black boots, a bustier, a mask covering the top of her face, her blond hair pulled back into a ponytail. Foggy frowns, turning his head to watch her walk past. “ _Marci?_ ” he says to her back, and is it just him or did the woman freeze for a second, twitch slightly? But she doesn’t look behind her, recovers herself and keeps walking. Foggy shakes his head. “Couldn’t have been. That’s crazy, Nelson. Don’t be nuts.” He flags down a cab.

“Okay, Matty. My delicious gothed-out tango-dancer. Let’s get ourselves home.”

**Author's Note:**

> How about that awesome illustration by [iraya??](http://iraya.tumblr.com/) Pretty sweet, right? It is so fun to see that scene come to life. :)
> 
> Title From Depeche Mode, [In Your Room](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=glh7ZqeGh6g) \- which is the song I have in my head that they start dancing to. ([Blue Dress](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vamnlQ45P7E) could also work, sexy and creepy af...)
> 
> The Inferno was the name of a real club, an awesome club, in a town I don’t live in anymore, which closed years ago. There were usually about 20 people there (smallish Midwestern town). Regulars included a woman who sometimes wore not much more than a feather boa. Everyone was friendly, and it was wonderful.
> 
> Mirrored-armor guy is also based on someone I actually saw years ago, at a larger club in a bigger city.
> 
> Club layout in my head based on [Berlin](http://www.berlinchicago.com/) in Chicago. Which I am too old and tired to go to most of the time I’m in Chicago, but one night they had a Depeche Mode/The Cure night, and we said We Are Doing This. Each time I was there, it was welcoming to all genders and sexual orientations, intimate, fun, and the DJs were great.
> 
> Tango is stupid hard. I joined my friend in some lessons once and hated it. But sometimes a dude would be really good at leading (and closer to my height, so I didn’t have my face smushed into his stomach), and I would just move where he wanted me to go, kind of effortlessly.


End file.
